As somebody who is attempting to organise a package of Ageing in Place I have to say that there is a vast gulf between the theory and reality.This is a good report but what it lacks is an injection of the harsh reality of how things work (more accurately don't work) in practice.

Many years ago in the UK there was a lot of time, money and effort put behind the concept of "Care in the Community". In theory this sounded just as plausible as Ageing in Place. Why do we keep people who cannot cope, for mental or physical reasons, in institutions when they could be cared for "in the community".

The easy, and financially beneficial bit, was shutting down the institutions. The hard bit was the community care.

Today the UK is still paying the price for this nice idea. The poor souls are back in institutions, except now they are prisons not places designed to help them.

I do hope the Ageing in Place concept does a better job of things. Dick Stroud

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Dick Stroud

Dick Stroud

Founder of 20plus30, a consultancy specialising in marketing to older consumers. He is the UK’s leading expert in understanding the implications of physical ageing on the way older people behave and the products they buy.